By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) Ray Bradbury’s classic short story ‘The Veldt’ (1952) is about a nursery in an automated home in which a simulation of the African veldt is conjured by some children. In a grim development, the lions which appear in the nursery start to feel rather more real than merely ‘simulated’
Literature
TODAY: In 1852, Nikolai Gogol burns some of his manuscripts, including most of the second part of Dead Souls, telling acquaintances the action is a practical joke played on him by the Devil. He takes to his bed and dies a few days later. Also on Lit Hub: Lynn Cullen on Dorothy Horstman, the
Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-68) is one of the great orators of the twentieth century. Several of his speeches have become part of the ‘canon’ of great oratory, and because he was delivering many of his speeches at landmark political events and in the era of television, we are lucky enough to hear him speak
February 23, 2023, 1:52pm Lessons were learned in Dr. Seuss’s 1957 classic, How The Grinch Stole Christmas. But, per USA Today, the Grinch appears to have fallen into old habits in a commissioned sequel, set the year after his heart grew three sizes. How the Grinch Lost Christmas! will be written by Alastair Heim and
Anne Bradstreet (c. 1612-72), who was the first poet, male or female, from America to have a book of poems published: The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung up in America appeared in 1650. Although she had been born in England in 1612, by the 1660s Bradstreet was living in Andover, Massachusetts. In 1630, just ten years
TODAY: In 1892, American journalist, writer, and activist Agnes Smedley is born. Also on Lit Hub: Robin Yeatman on the dangers of a fertile fantasy life • Anthony Anaxagorou on poetry at the intersection of colonialism and patriarchy • Read from Stênio Gardel’s newly translated novel, The Words That Remain (tr. Bruna Dantas Lobato)
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘The Negro Speaks of Rivers’ was the first mature poem that Langston Hughes (1901-67) had published, in 1921. The poem bears the influence of Walt Whitman, but is also recognisably in Hughes’ own emerging, distinctive voice. You can read ‘The Negro Speaks of Rivers’ here (the poem takes around
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘Caged Bird’ is a 1983 poem by the African-American poet and memoirist Maya Angelou (1928-2014). The poem originally appeared in Angelou’s collection Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing? The poem uses the image of a caged bird to explore issues of confinement, oppression, and restriction. You can read ‘Caged Bird’
The parking lot at the Sitka campus of the University of Alaska Southeast may be one of the most scenic parking lots in the nation. It sits on one side of Sitka Channel looking east across the water toward the town center. Fishing boats cruise slowly through the channel on the way to deliver their
Ada Limón, born in 1976, became the US Poet Laureate in 2022; in doing so, she was the first Latina to take on the post. Her poetry collections, which include The Hurting Kind (2022, Milkweed Editions), The Carrying (2018, Milkweed Editions), and Bright Dead Things (2015, Milkweed Editions), reveal a poet writing in a personal
February 21, 2023, 2:15pm When we first put the petition up, I wasn’t sure anyone would sign it. An irrational fear, I told myself. After all, I was one of 29 co-signers that included Alexander Chee, Maggie Smith, Kelly Link, Khadijah Queen, Sarah Schulman, Jeff VanderMeer, Porochista Khakpour, and Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore—writers renowned not only
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) Alliteration is arguably the king of the sound-effects in poetry. It’s defined by the OED as ‘the occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words, especially when employed for stylistic effect’. However, ‘sound’ is perhaps a more important, and more helpful,
February 21, 2023, 4:56am Hot off the presses: new books from Rebecca Makkai, Nona Fernández, and more! * Rebecca Makkai, I Have Some Questions for You(Viking) “This psychological thriller hits all the high notes, complete with at least a few revelations you won’t see coming.”–Good Housekeeping Erica Berry, Wolfish(Flatiron) “This blend of memoir and nature
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ is an 1892 short story by the American writer Charlotte Perkins Gilman. A powerful study of mental illness and the inhuman treatments administered in its name, the story succeeds largely because of its potent symbolism. Let’s take a look at some of the key symbols in
In TÁR’S opening sequence, Lydia Tár is fitted for a suit modeled after the male conductors that dominate her record collection. Director Todd Field’s message seems clear: this is a film about a woman who aspires to embody masculine power. And thanks to headlines like Huffington Post’s “TÁR is a fascinating reflection of the Me
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) Winston Churchill (1874-1965) was UK Prime Minister twice, between 1940 and 1945 and then again between 1951 and 1955. During his first term as Prime Minister, in the Second World War, he wrote and delivered some of the most rousing and powerful speeches ever given by a national leader,
Days after the attack on Pearl Harbor brought the United States into the Second World War, President Franklin Roosevelt’s wartime confidante, Anna Rosenberg, exhorted American women to “keep things going, no matter what happens… to take the men’s places in the shops and factories… We must carry on when those we hold dearest are fighting.”
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) ‘A Rose for Emily’ is William Faulkner’s most widely studied short story, and its distinctive narrative voice is one reason for the story’s continued appeal. More so than ‘Barn Burning’ and ‘Dry September’, which are probably Faulkner’s other best-known stories, ‘A Rose for Emily’ uses narration not as a